I created this blog – From My Heart to Yours – a couple of years ago as a tool of self-expression and to get the myriad of words out of my head and onto paper – or keyboard as the case may be. I have never hesitated on the topic or regretted posting any of them. It’s doubtful that I offend anyone since I direct any and all criticism, growth, mishaps, or challenges at myself. Always. I choose truth in transparency, seeking always to bring glory to God in the midst. His strength in my weakness and failures.

So I’m not certain what the difference is in this one. Why the hesitation. Maybe because it’s so intensely personal… like you are reading my journal… like I am exposed. Maybe because it isn’t uplifting or has no real ‘take-away’… but it is real and transparent. About grief. I read it to a handful of ‘safe’ folks who are on their own grief journey… and they encouraged me to share it. So, here you have it.

I live in Minnesota and we have had quite a wintry March. We had several feet of drifted snow everywhere we looked, and temperatures in the single digits as the calendar flipped past March 21 . . . Spring! It is hard to believe in the promises of Spring when Winter is still lurking all about.

But I had a friend remind me that things are not always what they seem.

A snowstorm left my family and I stuck at home, which gave us time to put a puzzle together. As we sorted the pieces, I found myself wondering what we all must wonder when the puzzle is still completely fragmented . . . “How are these pieces going to fit together to make any sort of sense?”